


Change

by diredragon



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Human Castiel, Implied Castiel/Dean Winchester, M/M, Teenage Castiel/Teenage Dean Winchester, Trans Castiel, Trans Male Character, Transgender Castiel, its implied like the entire time and then confirmed so yeah yknow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-27
Updated: 2014-06-27
Packaged: 2018-02-06 12:20:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1857843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/diredragon/pseuds/diredragon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Dean was younger, he had a friend called Cas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Change

**Author's Note:**

> sorry for any mistakes, I'm writing this like half asleep and at midnight but I had to write it so-
> 
> (original title was 'change isn't always a bad thing) but i changed it because the length and cliche-ness was annoying me lmao)

When Dean was younger, he had a friend called Cas.

  
Well, friend was probably an understatement. The two had practically been inseparable; they were joined at the hip, as Gabriel, Cas’ older brother, would say. Not that he had understood what it meant at the time, but oh well. You get the picture.

  
Even after years without seeing her, Dean was sure he could list off every single one of her quirks and traits.

  
He could still remember the way she’d sit in her garden and stare dreamily at the flowers and sky, wearing those cute ruffled white skirts and equally adorable blouses with the little bees sewn on the collar. Even to this day he can’t say he understood her obsession with bees, but he could remember the way she’d huff indignantly and explain how ‘they are very important for our environment, Dean.’

  
Cas was also the smartest person he’d ever met, apart from Sammy. She’d always fascinated him, and though half of the time he didn’t understand a word that came out of her mouth, he liked her a lot.

  
Sam did, too, which was great. He’d sit in her lap and stare wide-eyed at faded pages of books that belonged to Bobby as she read to him, and Dean could remember the smile on her pretty pink lips as her blue eyes flickered between the book and Sam.

  
Often they’d have sleepovers together, and admit things to each other that they wouldn’t usually say. It was easier to speak in the darkness and stillness of night when they were half asleep, after all. Cas would say how she liked being around Sam because she was the youngest out of her siblings so it was nice to have someone that was like a younger brother.

  
Dean would say he liked seeing his two favourite people in the world together, so he had no qualms with this.

  
Once or twice he was sure he caught her blushing whenever he called her one of his favourite people; but he never asked her about it, and considering the lack of light, his suspicions were never confirmed.

  
To be completely honest, though, his favourite thing about their sleepovers had been how she wouldn’t mind at all when he’d have nightmares. Even though he had only been four when it had happened, Dean still had nightmares even to this day about the fire that wrecked his old house and killed his mother. He and his brother had nearly been dragged into life on the road after that, when his father insisted that his mother had been killed by a demon. His uncle, Bobby, would say that it was just a side effect of grief, that he’d done his best at the time.

  
Dean decided that wasn’t the truth. Being left alone with your nearly new born baby brother with someone you didn’t know too well was hard, when you knew your dad was out there somewhere and not looking after you. If he had been doing his best, he’d have taken care of them.

  
But that was hardly important.

  
This was about Cas.

  
Whenever he did have bad dreams, and whenever he’d wake up screaming or crying or worse, Cas was always patient with him. She’d crawl out of her sleeping bag on the floor and move blindly in the dark until she found his bed. In worst case scenario she’d gently coax him out, quietly tell him it was fine as she changed the sheets, and then pull him into her sleeping bag with her. Luckily that didn’t happen often; luckily because it was embarrassing as shit, and the sleeping bag got kinda cramped, even if they had been younger.

  
Most of the time, though, she’d just crawl into his bed with him, wrap her skinny arms around him and pull him close. Dean could remember the stories she’d told him to calm him down, about angels. You would’ve thought it would hurt, considering one of the very few memories he had of his mum was her telling him that angels were watching over him.  
But instead of it being painful, it was oddly soothing instead. Which was, obviously, a good thing.

  
One time Cas admitted to him that when she had nightmares she’d crawl into bed with Gabriel, snuggle close and he’d tell her stories about their namesakes. They were named after angels, after all.

  
It made more sense from then on why she was good at comforting him. Or maybe she just knew him well enough to know how to comfort him, simple as. Dean liked to think, at the time, that he knew her well enough to comfort her if needed.

  
Cas didn’t get upset very often, though. He’d only seen her cry a few times. Once when she fell off her bike (he think she broke something; her foot? Her leg? He couldn’t remember) and again when her parents split up. The latter he understood more than the former, of course. Even though his parents hadn’t split up by choice, they had technically split up when the fire killed his mother.

  
She was strong, though. Stronger than he was, in fact. But it was okay, they were always there for each other.

  
Dean liked to think that if he and Sam had stayed in Sioux Falls with Bobby, their friendship would’ve developed into, well, something more than a mere friendship.  
Often it felt like it was more than that. Like when he called her his angel, or when she’d hold his hand as she all but dragged him into the garden so they could watch the bees together.

  
But they were just kids. They were practically family, too.

  
And perhaps there would’ve been something more than friendship; Dean didn’t know, though he wished he did. He wished he and Sam had stayed there, where they were happy. Where they went to school, where they had friends and family, where they had Cas.

  
But his father ruined it, as he ruined most things, Dean grew to decide. When he was thirteen and Sammy was nine, his dad came back, ranting and raving about how the boys were his and he’d be damned if Bobby kept them from him.

  
The memory was a vague one, much vaguer than the cherished memories he had of Cas, but Dean could remember Bobby telling him when he was old enough, he could return.  
After five years on the road with his insane father and his brother he kept protected no matter what, he was finally returning. With Sam, of course. It had been difficult to get away from their dad, but one yelled argument and several bruises and fights later, here they were.

  
Back in Sioux Falls.

  
Okay. The way that was worded makes it sound like they’ve literally just returned. Like, they’re standing hand in hand on a hill, looking over the town as the sun goes down and sighing happily because they know that life is finally gonna be alright.

  
That wasn’t the way it happened, but Dean could always pretend it did if he ignored the fact he was nineteen, for fucks sake.

  
Admittedly, his thoughts hadn’t immediately gone to Cas.

  
They’d gone to Bobby, who luckily took them back in without a second’s hesitation. They’d gone to whether or not Sam was going to finally settle back into school properly not. They’d gone to what the fuck he was even going to do now he’d graduated. When he was younger, he definitely wasn’t as smart as Sam or Cas, but he wasn’t stupid. Dean got decent grades and had a decent life at school, but that had all gone to shit when his father took him and Sammy away. But there was no need to think about that, of course.  
Bobby had said he should go to college. He’d said he wasn’t smart enough for that. Bobby had said he could always retake the last year of school.

  
Which was true, but there was no way Dean wanted to be stuck in that dump again. He knew he hadn’t gotten good enough grades for college; and besides, he knew Bobby wasn’t made of money, and he wanted Sam to go to college when he was old enough. He didn’t care about his own education, so it was decided he’d work at Singer’s Salvage with his uncle.

  
Which Dean was fine with. He liked cars, after all.

 

As they slowly began to adjust to their new life, he found himself hesitantly asking Bobby about Cas one night.

  
Was she still in town? Did she graduate? Is she going to college? Where’s she going to college? Does she have a boyfriend?

  
Well. He didn’t ask the last question, but he definitely thought it.

  
A few odd looks had been thrown his way as he used female pronouns, which made no sense whatsoever to Dean. It might’ve been a while ago, but Cas was still his best friend, and he knew if she was a boy or a girl, thank you very much.

  
He did get answers, though, and now he was, well, here. Back at the Novak household.

  
They hadn’t moved since he and Sam had left, which was a relief. Dean wanted them to be exactly the same, as if they’d been frozen in time when they went away. He’d open the door and walk through the living room, through the kitchen, out into the garden and there Cas would be. Sat in the grass with a calm look on her face, dressed in that white skirt and the blouse with the bees on it.

  
Obviously he knew from the start that wasn’t going to happen. For one thing, it had been five years. Cas was a fairly strange individual, sure, but he doubted she’d still be wearing such clothing. Not that he’d complain if she was, but whatever.

  
Walking up to the front door for the first time in five, nearly six now even, years was peculiar. It felt foreign, like he wasn’t meant to be here, not really.

  
Knocking on said door was even stranger, and Dean runs a hand nervously through his gelled hair as he waits for someone to answer.

  
No, not nervously, fuck. He was not nervous.

  
There’s a faint sound of bouncy sounding footsteps, and the instant the door is dramatically flung over, Dean knows its Gabe. The guy had always been like that, and it was nice to see he still was.

  
Within seconds a shit-eating grin is spreading out across Gabriel’s face, and Dean did not fucking squeak in surprise when he darts forward and draws him into the tightest hug he’s ever experienced in his entire life.

  
That was a slight shock, to say at the least. It wasn’t like he and Gabe had gotten on amazingly. Or maybe they had. All he had been able to think about for the past day or two, as cheesy as it sounds, was Cas.

  
It sounded very cheesy. Dean immediately pushes aside those thoughts, and the sound of the older yet humorously shorter boy talking helps with this.

  
“Dean-o!” He all but sang, moving back and then gesturing widely for him to come in. “Good to see ya again. My my, you really didn’t hold back with growin’, did you?”

  
“You sound like Bobby,” Dean grunts as he slips past him into the house, looking around at the white painted walls, the faded signs with ‘you can’t have a rainbow without the rain’ written on them and all that crap. Like it used to be. It felt almost like home.

  
Of course Gabriel just laughs as he shuts the door with the heel of his foot, before a suddenly serious look crosses his features.

  
“No ‘I-haven’t-seen-you-for-like-five-years’ sex or any ‘I missed you so much’s’ in this house, alrighty?” Any worry melts away immediately and Dean rolls his eyes, nudging Gabriel with his elbow sharply and nearly smiling when the boy (or man, now, rather, though it was weird to think of him as such) just laughs at him in delight.

  
“Righty, you go sit down or whatever, and,” He slips into the other corridor, and Dean listens as he yells as simple ‘Cas!’ up the stairs.

  
Fuck, he’d be seeing her in under like, five minutes, and this was real. Fuck.

  
Running a hand over his face, Dean decides to do as he was told, walking into the living room. Before he could take a seat on one of the patchwork sofas, he gets distracted by the photos on the mantelpiece. All old ones, nothing new. Then again, only Cas’ mother had been into taking photos, and as mentioned what felt like an age ago, his parents had gotten divorced.

  
There were two sets of footsteps, then three, and Dean glances over his shoulder. Gabriel all but glides into the room in his usual manner, a lollipop stuck in his mouth as he collapses on one of the sofas.

  
Two more had followed him into the room. Dean immediately hopes it’s not any of the other Novak’s, as they weren’t all as enjoyable as Cas and Gabe, and it was a relief that it wasn’t.

  
The girl he recognises as Meg; she had been Cas’ friend, who he’d grudgingly tried to get along with for her sake. Maybe time had really frozen when he left, as nothing seemed different. The decor was the same, Gabriel was the same, Meg was the same with her smug little smirk.

  
Then he looks at the guy behind her and fuck, things weren’t the same.

  
At first, Dean was confused. He was sure he didn’t recognise this boy. He was about to ask Meg if this was her boyfriend or something, when it clicks.

  
There had been something familiar about that facial structure, about the blue of those eyes, about how the guy was chewing his lip nervously despite smiling a little.  
This was Cas.

  
She looked a lot different. She looked like a guy.

  
That was when his brain finally catches up again, but properly this time. That was why Bobby had given him such a weird look when he referred to her as a girl.

  
Cas was a dude. Shit.

  
Now that he was looking properly, it was easy for him to tell it was her. Him. Whatever.

  
Okay, so there was a lot different. Instead of the skirts and blouses Cas was wearing a simple button up white shirt, black jeans and a rather cute black hoodie with wings on the back, though he didn’t get to see them until later on when he had his back to him.

  
The most noticeable difference, though, was definitely his hair.

  
When they were younger, Cas had beautiful hair, though Dean would never admit to brushing it whenever they had sleepovers. It had fallen over her shoulders in long dark waves, like a waterfall, but that was all gone. Now it was short and messy yet perfect, like someone had run their hands through it after a nice round of-

  
Dean should not be thinking about that now.

  
The silence had dragged on to the point it was awkward, and luckily Meg breaks it first.

  
“Close your mouth, Winchester, you look like a fish,” She drawled as she sits beside Gabriel, grabbing the TV remote to turn the television on.

  
“I do not.” He mumbles, gaze flickering away from her back to Cas.

  
He was still staring at Dean, and maybe it should make him uncomfortable, but it didn’t. He was used to her – him - staring at him.

  
“Hey, Cas,” Dean greets in a mumble after a moment, all too aware of Gabriel and Meg watching them. It was making him uncomfortable, to be honest.

  
Cas seems to catch up with this and he turns his back and leaves (that’s when he first gets a glimpse of the wings on the hoodie, that bounced a little with each of his steps.)  
Another may think he was just being abandoned, but Dean knew Cas well enough to just follow after him without a second thought.

  
When they eventually find themselves in Cas’ room (his house was hardly small,) Dean watches as the shorter boy closes the door behind them.

  
“So,” He starts, only to be cut off before he could continue. Something was being pressed against his lips; Cas’ lips, he realises, and before he can even begin to enjoy it he was pulling away. He definitely pulled away far too soon, and if he wasn’t staring at him dumbfound perhaps he’d lean back in again.

  
“I understand if you just want to be friends,” Cas says quietly, moving to sit on the edge of his bed, frowning down at his hands in concentration. “Or if you don’t even want to be friends, I suppose. A lot has changed over the past few years, I know, but I missed you, Dean. I believe that the entire time I knew you I had feelings for you, but now we’re older I understand this better, and now I’m a guy it is understandable if you don’t want anything to do with me and I-“

  
“Woah, woah,” Dean laughs shakily, hiding his nerves with humour and a small grin. No surprise there. “Cas, buddy, it’s fine. I just wish you had told me sooner.”

  
There’s a pause of silence as he moves to sit beside him on his bed.

  
“You mean it?” Cas asks quietly, still frowning down at his hands.

  
“Yeah, I do. I mean, it’s kinda cool that you’re a guy, actually.”

  
“It is?”

  
“Hell yeah it is. I’m glad you’ve told me now.”

  
“You are?”

  
“Yup. ‘Cause now I can correctly tell people you’re my boyfriend and not my girlfriend.”

  
Dean is still grinning as he looks at Cas, who slowly lifts and turns his head to look at him, a doubtful look in his eyes that quickly fades away as he looks at him. When he leans in this time to press their lips together, it was slow and sweet. There was no rush, after all. Dean wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

  
“We have a lot of catching up to do,” Cas mumbles to him eventually, and smiles almost bashfully when he laughs.

  
“Yeah, I know. In all seriousness, though, I missed you, too.”

  
So maybe Dean had spent all those years mourning the loss of his childhood friend Cas, wishing he could see her again, he didn’t mind so much now. After all, he had his adulthood friend Cas now, and he was just fine with him.

  
Better than fine, in fact.


End file.
